


Grieve No More

by Khione_North



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: Angst, F/M, Final Fantasy XIV: Shadowbringers Spoilers, Fluff, Fluff and Smut, I Blame Book Club, Mating Bond, Memories, Regrets, Reminiscing, Reunion Sex, Soul Bond
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-12
Updated: 2020-10-12
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:35:52
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26961517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Khione_North/pseuds/Khione_North
Summary: In his youth, whenever he dreamed of falling love, of finding his life-mate, G’raha Tia dreamt of a woman who smelled of roses and blackcurrants and jasmine and magic, who tasted of fresh-fallen snow and sharpened steel and warm vanilla.  In his dreams, the woman always had eyes of silver flames, like the tails of comets reflecting the moon’s pale grace.
Relationships: G'raha Tia | Crystal Exarch/Warrior of Light
Comments: 6
Kudos: 33





	Grieve No More

In his youth, whenever he dreamed of falling love, of finding his life-mate, G’raha Tia dreamt of a woman who smelled of roses and blackcurrants and jasmine and magic, who tasted of fresh-fallen snow and sharpened steel and warm vanilla. In his dreams, the woman always had eyes of silver flames, like the tails of comets reflecting the moon’s pale grace.

The day a young thaumaturge, stupidly short and wearing ridiculously high heels to compensate for it, showed up at Saint Coinach’s Find, G’raha felt like he’d been smacked in the face with a sack of bricks. 

He’d tasted her aether on the wind a little before she’d actually appeared. The sensation had been foreign and dizzying, like something was hooked behind his navel and tugging him to the edge of his perch on the scaffolding to bear witness to the adventurer’s arrival.

To this day, he still doesn’t regret playing a prank on her in the Black Shroud, making her chase after bags of aethersand. To this day, she still giggles and pokes him playfully in the ribs when he reminds her of that first, informal meeting.

But it was their first formal meeting that really pulled the world out from beneath G’raha’s steady feet.

Her hair was shorter then, and devoid of any streaks of white or pale blue, and she kept the sides braided back, while the wavy mass of it mostly brushed over her collarbones. It reminded G’raha of the evening sky turning from dusky pink to deepest blue.

Her coat was too big for her petite frame, but the stormy blue of it suited her nicely, while the length helped distract G’raha from the distinct lack of length of her black skirt. From the very first, he found himself quite entranced with every aspect of this celestial creature, this Eikon Slayer with eyes of silver stars.

The moons they passed together, exploring the Crystal Tower and Allag’s legacy, felt like an answer to a question G’raha never knew he’d asked. Khione was easy to orbit, her presence quiet, but welcoming. She was quick to smile, quicker still to blush, and her laughter was infectious, if only because she sounded like a goose with a witch’s shrill cackle. G’raha thought it was the most beautiful sound he’d ever heard.

Until he heard her singing.

“Now rest you there, in spite of the storm that is raging~ Faith goes and comes, as long as the seasons are changing~ I’m sure there is a safe valley, for you and for me~”

G’raha sat and listened, transfixed by the ethereal quality of her voice, by the way she waltzed with a partner unseen on the shores of Lake Silvertear beneath the silver moonlight.

It felt like she was singing directly into his soul, each note bringing that much more clarity to his everchanging mind.

When G’raha made the decision to lock himself in the Tower, to close the doors on a future that might have been spent at Khione’s side, a not-insignificant amount of the pain he felt in his chest, in his very heart, wasn’t actually his. It was cold and sharp, and smelled of roses and blackcurrants, tasted of snow and steel. 

In the darkness of the Tower, the loneliness, he dreamt of dancing with her, of singing along with her mournful tune.

“Where we would fly, in joy we’d cry for our blessed land~ For what we strive would come alive~ And you would grieve no more~”

_“Where we would fly, in joy we’d cry for our blessed land~ For what we strive would come alive~ And you would grieve no more~”_

When he awoke into a world where Khione North no longer breathed, G’raha felt like he was actually suffocating, like a piece of him was just…gone.

For the very first time, he considered that, perhaps, there had been something more between himself and the tiny thaumaturge from Ishgard, something that went beyond a youthful crush and grandiose dreams of a sweeping romance for the ages.

It was this consideration that had him pouncing on the idea of sending himself and the Tower through time and space for the mere _chance_ that he could save her, that he could exist in the same plane and time as her once more.

One hundred years and some change, he waited and hoped. Four disappointments later, and he nearly gave up, except that, that thing tugging at his core, his heart; it wasn’t a thing. It was a thread, spun of pale, thin silver and finest gold. One last time, he stood before his all-seeing mirror, chanted the ancient spell, focused his being solely on _her_ , and finally, **finally** , she responded.

It was faint, a tiny whisper in the back of his mind, but it was cold and lovely, and he could have sworn he smelled roses and blackcurrants and jasmine and magic for the briefest moment.

And then, he was stood before her in a realm between realms.

She was little more than a flickering shade, and there was no time for him to stop and consider her, consider the implications of what he was doing, while he gave her the instructions to the beacon he and Urianger had sent through the Rift. He could only pray that she felt the call as strongly as he did.

The day that followed was among the most harrowing he’d ever experienced in his life. He was a nervous bundle of energy and anxiety and desperate hope.

He all but threw caution to the wind when she finally arrived on the First.

G’raha’s feet couldn’t carry him fast enough, his lungs couldn’t gulp down enough air as he sprinted through The Crystarium, down to the Exarch Gate.

Fear clanged through him, fear that was not his own, but quickly replaced by bewilderment and—

There she was, standing beside Lyna, watching the remnants of a sin eater float away on the wind.

By the Twelve, she was even more stunning than he remembered.

Her hair had grown out, now tumbling over her shoulders and back in midnight waves to her hips, and finally, she wore a coat that genuinely fit, grey-blue material that was tailored to give the appearance of a slightly curvier waist than he knew she had. Darker blue ruffles poked out of the slight bell sleeves, and she wore matching gloves that ended in vicious claws. Her trousers were simple black leggings as best he could tell, practical and comfortable, but true to form, she wore a pair of stupidly high-heeled boots to help make up for her lack of natural height.

Her face was a few years sharper, and her moon-silver eyes no longer danced with curiosity and mirth as once they had. Her presence was undeniable: She was no longer just the Eikon Slayer or the Champion of Eorzea, no longer the budding thaumaturge who danced on the shores of Silvertear with a pretend partner.

The woman standing before G’raha was Khione Agesandra North, one of the most powerful and proficient black mages of her time, the Dragonsong, the Fury’s Handmaiden, the liberator of both Doma and Ala Mhigo, the Warrior of Light.

…. And she was his mate.

Now that Khione stood before him for real, G’raha’s entire existence tectonically shifted and realigned.

Holy. Bloody. Hells.

She was his mate.

But he couldn’t tell her.

He couldn’t tell her, even when she roared at him for jeopardising her friends and family and the entire Source.

He couldn’t tell her when, after the fight at Holminster Switch and the return of night to Lakeland, she invited him to join her for tea and stargazing and ended up falling asleep in his arms; nor any of the nights after that he spent in her bed, holding her close with his face still shadowed by his hood.

He couldn’t tell her when he sent her into danger time after time, nor when relief threatened to overtake him each and every time she returned safely.

He couldn’t tell her when she began to fracture beneath the weight of Primordial Light raging through her soul.

He couldn’t tell her when they sat against a rock in Kholusia and he poured his dearest dreams out to her; nor when he moved to sacrifice himself on her behalf.

He _wanted_ to tell her when she called out his name through the haze of her own soul-deep pain, but Emet-Selch stole that chance from him, forced him to live with his own guilt.

G’raha should have told her when, after they returned to The Crystarium, bruised and bloodied from the battle against The Architect, she tended to his wounds and slept in his bed to make sure he survived the night, but once more, he did not.

He definitely should have told her the first time they were intimate, and every time after that. He should have crowed it from the height of the Tower so that all the citizens of Norvrandt could hear: Khione North was _his mate_.

The list went on and on, so many missed opportunities, so many words left unsaid.

When he awoke in the Crystal Tower, Khione kneeling beside his sleeping pallet with big, hopeful tears in her eyes, G’raha decided enough was enough.

The ache in her legs was nothing compared to the anxious, excited ache in her chest that had nothing to do with her burning lungs as she ran at full tilt from Revenant’s Toll to the Tower.

It gleamed ahead of her, a column of pale blue faerie dust splitting the dusky twilight sky of Mor Dhona. Some of that magic seemed to rub off on her, spurring her feet on impossibly faster. She leapt over rocks and divots in the road, fairly flying toward her goal.

Toward Raha.

Khione’s gown was coated in dust and no small amount of sweat by the time she reached the grand, gilded doors of the Syrcus Tower. For a brief, fleeting moment, she worried about the state of her hair and appearance, but the warmth of Azem’s crystal in one hand, and the gentle glow of G’raha’s soul vessel in the other, was a soothing balm to her flustered, fluttering heart.

The sorceress took half a minute to calm her tangled curls and acknowledge the mighty doors, praying that they open for her.

She took off running once more the minute they did. Fling wide the gates indeed.

The stairs to the top felt endless, her impatience growing with every level she climbed until at last she reached the Ocular, bursting through its familiar yet unfamiliar doors. With her goal so close, the doors to the Umbilicus were no match for the strength of her magic — he had warned her that he’d locked himself in, though she had no doubt that he would later chide her for using black magic to destroy any part of the ancient structure _when_ he awakes, because she was certain this would work. It had to work. She would accept no other result.

Her heart faltered as she gazed upon his sleeping form. It was so strange to see him hale and whole and completely Spoken. His carmine hair was unbound, splayed across a pillow like the rays of the sun rising above the horizon; and the lines of his face were so soft and gentle, unlined by the stress of many centuries and impending death. She _almost_ hated the thought of waking him, but the thought of holding him and feeling the warmth of his lips on her skin and hearing the honeyed rumbling of his voice as he speaks her name spurred her on as she knelt beside his prone form. She laid the crystal upon his chest. And. Waited.

It was the longest minute of her life.

Just when her hope began to falter, G’raha stirred. Khione watched him like a hawk.

“Huhnnnh?” He slowly sat up, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. He looked around, stopping when he spied Khione waiting with bated breath.

“Did it work?” he finally murmured.

Khione pounced with an excited shriek and they laid together as a tangle of limbs and joy for a moment before he sat up with her cradled in his lap. She nearly melted in relief when warm, strong arms that smelled of cinnamon and cedar and sandalwood and ancient parchment and misty nights in a faraway land wrapped around her, crushing her tight against his chest that felt like home and an answered prayer. 

Her mate was safe. Her mate, whom she’d known was hers since the day he leapt from the scaffolding above her with feline flourish, was alive and in her arms once more.

G’raha purred as he buried his face in Khione’s hair, and she smiled so widely that her cheeks began to ache immediately, but she was just so happy to be able to hold him and be held by him without any crystal guarding his skin or the hum of an ancient Tower distracting his mind from the here and now, from her.

Khione did not realise she was crying until G’raha leaned down to kiss each individual tear of diamond-brilliant joy from her cheeks before slanting his mouth over hers in a starving, desperate kiss that was relief and love and passion and fire all in one.

Suddenly, her clothing felt too tight, too stifling, because she _needed_ to feel every inch of his fair, freckled skin, _needed_ to reacquaint herself with every ilm of him, and by the way his hands twitched at the back laces of her storm blue gown, she knew he reciprocated her sentiments. It was all she could do to refrain from actually _tearing_ his clothing off of him.

It was not the first time they had lain together. It was not even the tenth. After Emet-Selch’s defeat, Khione spent much of the rest of her nights in Norvrandt in G’raha’s arms, the two of them finding new and increasingly creative ways to make each other orgasm so hard, they were both seeing stars. It had felt so wonderfully natural; she had felt at home in the arms of the man with the fire-bright eyes of scarlet she’d so often dreamt of as a girl. Her mate.

It was not the first time, but it felt like the first time, and it was an intoxicating rush of pure need as their mouths collided and their fingers scrambled to undo all of the damnable layers they both wore, and Khione was wound so tight already that she came on G’raha’s finger before he even fully inserted it because the satisfied hiss he made at finding how wet she was sent her mind into a flurry of white hot desire, and though she is a proud woman, she _begged_ him to finger fuck her because she was smart enough to know that she needed preparation before she could take him.

G’raha did not disappoint. By now, he had learned exactly how to make her sing like a soprano in an opera, and he was unafraid of putting that knowledge to use as he laid her out beneath him. He kissed his way down her body with a reverence that broke her heart, and filled her with three of his fingers, hooking them to stroke her g-spot while his silver tongue and gleaming fangs worked at her clit. Khione could only tug helplessly at his fiery hair, a string of mewled curses falling from her lips as she came undone for a second time. Still, her body needed more, more, _more_ of him.

Her lover smirked at her with impish mischief in his scarlet eyes, tracing his index finger — covered in her juices — across her lip. She took all three fingers in her mouth, sucking greedily before she pulled him down for another kiss.

“Want you _now_ ,” G’raha snarled, and Khione feared she might turn to jelly at the pure command in his voice, the way his eyes burned with flame as he bit one of her nipples hard enough to make her almost jump out of her skin. Everyone should be so lucky to have such a bond with someone so skilled.

“By the Fury, **_please_** ,” she begged without an onze of shame.

Khione wept in blissful relief when G’raha buried himself in her. He turned his attention to her breasts, kneading and sucking and nipping and pinching, while he set a pace with his hips that was so agonisingly slow, Khione wondered if he intended to keep her there with him for the next century. She imagined she wouldn’t mind.

She muffled her moans and wails by sucking marks on every bit of G’raha’s skin that she could, claiming and possessive — she wanted the entire star to know that G’raha Tia was _hers_ , Halone help her, and she would not tolerate any who dare try to make a move on him. Not when this man was her soul-bonded, her mate, the perfect matching piece to her heart.

Their souls intertwined as their bodies collided. G’raha’s was warm and gentle and so full of love and hope and excitement that the jagged edges of Khione’s own soul disappeared, replaced by G’raha’s radiance. He was hers and she was his, and she could not imagine life any other way. Not anymore.

G’raha sped up, his thrusts becoming more forceful and frantic the closer they both got to the edge. He captured her lips as they leapt over the falls together, stars dancing in their eyes at the force of their shared climax.

It was many moments before either of them was capable of coherent thought or speech. They grinned at each other like mad fools in the interim, glowing with joy and adoration and sweat in the blue crystal light of the Umbilicus.

G’raha gently tucked an errant curl out of Khione’s face and behind her ear, his touch lingering to explore the sharp line of her cheekbone. The next kiss he gave her was so beautifully pure that Khione forgot how to breathe for a moment.

“Welcome home, G’raha Tia,” she finally sniffled, eyes welling with joyful tears once more. “Welcome home, my beloved mate.”  
“’Tis good to be home, my beautiful Khione, my mate.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! I wanted to go back and explore one of my FFXIVwrite prompts, plus soul bonds are my jam.
> 
> The song Khione sings is "Grieve No More" by Patty Gurdy.
> 
> If you enjoyed this and want to meet some of the awesome people who helped inspire it (plus many more awesome people!), come join us at [Emet-Selch's Wholesomely Debauched and Enabling Book Club!](https://discord.gg/enabling-debauched-xivfic)
> 
> Don't forget to leave a comment or shoot me a message!
> 
> -Blue


End file.
